


longer odds, painted red

by sunshowerst



Series: danny and rusty and no one else on earth [2]
Category: Ocean's Eleven Trilogy (Movies)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Major Character Injury, Panic Attacks, rusty gets hurt bad and danny freaks out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-15 23:27:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29072538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunshowerst/pseuds/sunshowerst
Summary: It was never about the money for the two of them. It's never a win if either loses something they can't steal to have again.or, rusty bleeds, and danny is terrified of the reminder that he can.
Relationships: Danny Ocean/Rusty Ryan
Series: danny and rusty and no one else on earth [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2128335
Comments: 6
Kudos: 28





	longer odds, painted red

Rusty lost a lot of blood. 

You wouldn't be able to tell that by his face which, aside from the badly masked surprise and even more badly masked grimace, remained politely curious as he stepped aside and let Danny into his apartment. 

It was early evening in January, which meant it was like any late night in any month that the sun actually did its only job in, and Danny's been in Rusty's apartment only twice before now, and never for an actual reason. There's new paintings on the wall above the fireplace and a different kitchen color scheme, black on gray on blacker that looked as much of a blank slate as everything Rusty ever owned did. Enough room to make it up as he goes along, he thinks, and for a fraction of a second it's comforting that he knows that about him. 

He finds himself worrying he'll hear a thud of a body falling to the ground but Rusty's standing there when he turns around, in his own living room and looking at Danny like he's not even going to bother reading him, like he's off the clock. 

Danny sees that he's almost swaying on his feet, almost too weak to stand. Sees through the sheer fabric of his white cotton tshirt, an outline of a bandage twining up his right side like ethanol-doused ivy and his mouth goes dry. 

Rusty looks at him like he wants to ask why he's there or if he's suddenly grown unaware of how risky it was to come here, merely hours after the job they pulled off when half the men of the man they parted from his blood emeralds of south african origin were out for a different kind of blood, of american origin. 

Danny doesn't really have an answer for him, though, not yet, and Rusty was always good at waiting for those. 

"Wine?" he asks, casually. Everything is fine until we address it, that's Rusty Ryan's motto and life philosophy and Danny would argue like he always does, but the cotton feel of his mouth and the heaviness pressing on his temples from the inside protests before he can. And Rusty's lost a lot of blood. 

"Sure."

Takes him a few seconds to realize that he should be the one going to the kitchen to pour them a drink cause, well, Rusty was alive by an off chance; and when he pours them a glass each of something that was too much red and not enough purple, he halts for twenty seven seconds and stares at nothing and denies the startle when Rusty comes up from behind and swiftly takes the glasses away. 

He's still frozen, his heart hammering away in his chest and Rusty is just right there, behind him, leaning on the counter less to be casual and more to spare himself some of the herculean effort it took to keep himself upright, and Danny remembers that Rusty wouldn't be putting up this act of being all fine if Danny didn't stop by to have a breakdown. 

"You're freaking out cause I almost died."

Danny lets out a shuddering breath, and feels in real time his brain's plummeting into the recent past and the final divorce with Tess and how it was the least impactful end of the world he'd ever seen cause there were better things to look at. Namely, Rusty. And his million megawatt smile when he finally convinced Danny to sell his stupid house to a fraternity and had it painted bright red and yellow the day before he sold it. Because those were the frat's colors, and the worst nightmare one HOA president and ex-tennis player turned mother of three upstanding kids could dream up in her life, when she's not making passive aggressive comments about Danny for "mowing his lawn all wrong". 

("It was imperial red and wax pepper actually, Jesus, no wonder she left him," Rusty says to amend the retelling to Reuben and gets himself a bruised calf for his trouble.)

Rusty was there, always. Like the sun would be, even in January, for just a little while. But there. 

He's still looking at Danny and still looking as sheet-white as he did earlier today, when Danny was letting him squeeze his hand and begging him to stay awake, when Basher was stitching him up on full awareness and the adrenaline that only made it worse, when his blood was making his once white button down stick to his torso, when it was everywhere, the blood, his blood, and the sound of him hissing and wincing and-

"Hey."

"Yeah."

"Danny."

"Yeah."

"I'm right here."

"Okay."

"It's not your fault."

It is. He shouldn't have assigned Linus with deep cover in the first place, cause if he didn't then he wouldn't have been made right away for his young age and Rusty wouldn't have had to go in to save face and get himself nearly killed getting Linus out, cause Rusty asked him if he was sure about Linus and the fact that he asked should've been telling enough regarding his thoughts on Danny's casting decisions, but. 

Rusty is standing right there, but hours before his jaw was clenched shut and his teeth grinding and his hair matted down with sweat across his forehead and he still had time to squeeze Danny's hand in reassurance, that he's there and has the strength to do it, and the easiest seven figures any of them ever earned weren't nearly enough to make it worth it. Make seeing that feel like any less of a loss, with or without the wins. 

And it was, his fault. But. 

That wasn't it. 

"That's not it," he says without needing to, cause Rusty's squinting at him and even though his eyes look glassy and glazed over Danny knows he'll realize it before long. 

Rusty brushes his thumb under his mouth, a quick one-two, and Danny's throat closes up. 

"Then you-- oh."

"Yeah."

"Ah. Okay."

He leads Danny do his room and leans onto him more than Danny was able to stomach right now. He stares at the bed, suddenly unsure of any rhyme or reason for this, as Rusty climbs in and groans at the strain the bending part put on his side, and that's enough to snap Danny out of himself. 

He thinks about how little sense he's made since the moment he stepped into Rusty's place, and thinks about leaving as soon as Rusty's asleep (unconscious, more that than willingly asleep) and drowning himself and the prickling under his skin and nail beds in copious amounts of anything that wasn't red wine. 

"I don't wan' to roll onto my side accidentally," Rusty, ever the savior, says, and Danny would give him smartest man on earth if Rusty brought it up now, cause that was just the brand of bullshit excuse his brain was willing to grasp at and justify his arms pulling Rusty's back flush to his chest. Burying his nose into Rusty's hair, smelling peach and mint and familiar, like the shape of Rusty's body was, in his hold. 

He breathes in deep and waits for his brain to catch up and leave it's stuttered state, and his left hand ends up finding Rusty's wrist and holding it such that he feels the faint pulse under his fingertips, and it's then that the prickling stops.

His mouth goes back to normal when Rusty breathes in deep and even and that close to his chest, that snug in his arms that he feels his ribs expand as he does, feels him warm and alive and _alive_ and his soul sings hymns to gods with blond hair and pearls for teeth for not caring about long odds. 

He listens to Rusty breathe till the image of his lips, purple and cracked, and his eyes, foggy and distant, leaves his head, and then he falls asleep.

-

"What?"

Rusty is looking at him with a glint in his eye and laughing to himself and at the tray on his lap, with a still warm croissant from a shop that's a block over and a pot of fondue and strawberries, a caramel latte like Rusty orders it and a glass of orange juice that Danny will end up finishing. It's been a while since he'd seen Rusty fresh off sleep and he makes himself focus on his unruly hair and the rasp in his voice instead of the slight twitches and quick exhales that barely let him in on how much pain he still was in. 

"It's nothing," Rusty says and shakes his head, amused. 

It was their thing, not having to ask. On any other day, aside from the one after he could've lost Rusty, he wouldn't have had to.

"Just that-- I should _almost_ die more often, you know, if this--" Rusty says while chewing the pastry salaciously, and gives a close-mouthed smile, cause Danny caught up and rubbed at his face as if he was actually annoyed at all. 

"You're not letting this go any time soon, are you," Danny asks through his hands and hears the grin without having to see it. 

"Over my dead body, Daniel," he promises all serious, and Danny breathes normal again, after that, and doesn't go near wine for half a year.

**Author's Note:**

> as always, likes/kudos/comments appreciated! thank you for the support on the previous one <3


End file.
